Ez-ra
by Ezra's Girl
Summary: Chris and Ezra alone on the trail....Will they make it home before they kill each other?


Title: Ez-ra  
  
Disclaimer: The characters aren't mine. Oh how I wish they were! They belong to MGM, Trilogy, John Watson, etc. I am not making anything off of this, so don't sue me. Please. I don't have much anyway- my most valuable possessions are my much worn copies of Mag 7 episodes and I'll die before I give those up.   
  
Summary: This is just a little something I jotted down in one day. I just really wanted to do something with Chris and Ezra. I love them and their relationship. So here it is!  
  
  
  
  
******  
Part 1  
******  
  
  
  
Chris grinned in the sparse light of the predawn sky. He and Ezra were transferring a prisoner for Judge Travis. They'd stopped to make camp last night, since they were still a good ten hours ride from Four Corners. Normally Chris would not have picked Ezra to be his companion on a long ride, but the gambler had been particularly annoying lately and this would serve as good as any punishment. So here they both were and Chris remained smiling at the thought of rousing the man who thought that noon was still morning. "Ezra." he said while softly tapping his friend's shoulder.  
  
Ezra mumbled something incomprehensible.  
  
"Ezra." Chris said louder and shaking him harder.  
  
"Yes, my dear." Ezra said rolling over to his other side and slipping back into unconsciousness.  
  
"What the-?" Chris stepped back, not wanting to be confused any more with one of Ezra's "paramour's". Chris took the bucket that he'd brought (specifically for this purpose) down to the stream they were camping near. He filled it with the frigid winter water and crept back to the area where the gambler slept. He gave the man one more chance and called out loudly, "Ezra!"  
  
"Later!" The southerner drowsily drawled.  
  
"Okay you asked for it." Chris warned. Then poured the water all over the man, waking him in an instant.  
  
Horror of all Horrors! Ezra snapped up out of his bedroll. What the hell? Then he looked at the dark clad gunslinger in front of him. "MR. LARABEE!" he yelled. "You are... You.... I" he stuttered too angry to find the right words.  
  
"I am an imbecilic, reprobate. An uncouth, nefarious, simpleton? A lazy good for nothin' southern gambler? Oh wait a minute that's you. Maybe I am a loathsome objectionable curmudgeon."  
  
Ezra glared at him for a moment before speaking, "First of all, Mr. Larabee, loathsome and objectionable mean quite the same thing, therefore using them together is redundant. Second of all, I would have also commented on your lineage in a demeaning manner. Finally, you forgot, in your apt descriptions, vile cowboy."  
  
"Did you just call me a cowboy?"  
  
"If you'll excuse me, I must dry off before I catch pneumonia." and with that Ezra snatched up his saddlebags and stormed off.  
  
Chris chuckled aloud at the retreating and dripping form. Ezra turned back to glare at him and Chris stopped laughing immediately raising his eyebrows innocently, but the picture before him was to great. He took one look at Ezra's wet hair plastered to his head, his clothes sticking to him, and shivering like a leaf and busted out with laughter.  
  
"I'm elated to be of use to you in such an amusing capacity, Mr. Larabee."  
  
"I'm sorry Ez. Look I'll make some hot coffee." Chris called, still laughing, to the man's back.  
  
"MY NAME IS EZ-RA!" was the only shouted reply.  
  
  
  
  
******  
Part 2  
******  
  
About 5 hours later:  
  
  
Achoo! Ezra sneezed loudly into his handkerchief. He sighed and tried to sink deeper into the warmth of his woolen coat.  
  
"God bless you! Are you coming down with something, Ez-ra?" Chris asked, his voice flooding with concern but smiling. He'd been annoying the man all day by calling him "Ez-ra" taking cautious care to pronounce both syllables of his name distinctly.  
  
"Thanks to you." Ezra accused.  
  
"Well don't you worry none." Chris soothed, "I'm sure Nathan has something he can give you for it when we get back home. What do you call them? Pungent elixirs?"   
  
Ezra grimaced at that particular thought, "The only things I will require upon our return will be, the bottle of scotch that Inez reserves especially for myself, my feather bed, my room, a fire, and solitude." These warm thoughts made him smile.  
  
They rode on in silence for a while. Ezra spoke first. "This God-forsaken territory has the most inclement and frigid weather!"  
  
"Yeah it gets pretty cold around here. Ez-ra, why do you insist on saying twenty words when just a couple will get your point across just as good?"  
  
"Just as well."  
  
"Huh?"  
  
"I was rectifying your grammatical aptitude, or rather the lack thereof."  
  
"Well don't! We both know what I meant."  
  
"Very well."  
  
"So?"  
  
"May I be of assistance, Mr. Larabee?"  
  
"See what I mean? Why not just say 'What do you want Chris?' No you use sentences longer than the Rio Grande and words bigger than the Rockies. What is that? Some kind of hinting that you're better than everybody?"  
  
"Well in terms of vocabulary, I categorically am. That fact must be undisputed."  
  
Chris rolled his eyes.  
  
Ezra saw this and smirked, "You know the temperature in which we know find ourselves besieged, I believe, would rival that of the Arctic."  
  
"Yes Ezra!" Chris exploded- forgetting about separating the syllables, "I heard you. It's cold. It's damn cold. It's real damn cold."  
  
"Really."  
  
"Really what?"  
  
"You should have used really in that last sentence. You were describing how damn. Damn in this case is being used as an adjective. Real is also an adjective, but you must use an adverb to modify an adjective. Really is an adverb. You should have said: 'It's really damn cold'."  
  
If looks could kill, Ezra would have been dead on the spot- such was the look that he got from Chris Larabee.  
  
"My point, Ez-ra is that I'm sick of hearing you complain about the weather. I've heard you each of the hundred times you've done it and differently each way doesn't make it better. Okay. I admit it. You have a better vocabulary than me. Hell- than half the territory. Now shut up about it!"  
  
More silence ensued after that. Then Ezra said with an evil twinkle in his eye, "Das Wetter ist zweifellos sehr kalt."  
  
"What?"  
  
"You don't speak German?"  
  
"What do you think? What did you say?"  
  
"I said the weather is certainly very cold."  
  
"Don't make me kill you, Ez-ra."  
  
Silence descended once more upon the men, but was soon broken by Ezra sneezing.  
  
"God bless you!" Chris said mock-sympathetically.  
  
"Shut up!"  
  
  
  
  
******  
Part 3  
******  
  
  
About four and a half hours after that-   
  
  
Four Corners was just barely visible to the two riders going toward it. The two men were completely silent and had been for sometime. Chris' silence was natural for him. Ezra's silence was the result of both the threat of being assigned to help Josiah fix the church and the good, old-fashioned Larabee glare. The sound of horses approaching brought them both around and soon they saw a group of five coming up behind them. Within a few minutes, the gang was considerably closer and called out to the two men. Ezra and Chris both turned.  
  
"Howdy fellas!" one of men, presumably the leader, said, "boy are we lucky ya'll happened by."  
  
Chris and Ezra remained expectantly silent.  
  
The leader continued, "I'm Chad Barnett and this here's the Barnett Gang. M' brothers here: Michael, David, Tom, and Logan."  
  
Ezra and Chris found themselves surrounded at this point.   
  
"Mike, get their guns. Now, give us your money. See this here's a real live western type holdup."  
  
Ezra paused only for a moment, "Oooweee! Goldarnit, didja hear that?" he said in a thick country accent, "A real live robbery, like in them dime store novels I read. Don't hurt us mister! We ain't go no money with us right now, but if you come with us, we got us a whole bunch of gold from an ol' mine. I'll give it to you iffen you don't hurt us. Right, Chris?"  
  
Chris looked at him incredulously.  
  
Ezra went on, "Don'tcha pay him no mind. He don't ever talk much to nobody. Look the town's not too far out from here. Look you can see it." he said pointing.  
  
Chad began whispering to the brother closest to him and after a few minutes said, "Okay we'll go with you, but you better not try anything, or well shoot you both dead. Understand?"  
  
"Oh yes sir!" Ezra agreed allowing some fear to come out of his voice.  
  
  
  
  
  
******  
Part 4  
******  
  
  
Vin sat outside the saloon on the lookout for Chris and Ezra. "I hope they're still in one piece." he thought. He could hear Buck, JD, Nathan, and Josiah inside laughing and was about to go join them, when he saw a big group of horses riding in. What made him nervous, though, was the dark figure and red figure in the middle of them. "Like they're captured." he whispered. He walked into the saloon calling out to his friends, "I think we got trouble."  
  
JD looked up from his milk, "What's the problem, Vin?"  
  
"Some guys got Chris and Ezra." Vin answered.  
  
Now the men dashed over to the windows to get a look. Sure enough the group of men stopped, and dismounted. Then they motioned for Chris and Ezra to do the same. Then they moved to come into the saloon. But, Vin and the others were already in position and before the Barnett gang knew what was going on, they were in custody.  
  
"Next time, don't try and rob anyone smarter than yourselves." Ezra chided.  
  
"Or the law," Chris added.  
  
Achoo! Ezra sneezed again.  
  
"Hey, Nathan," Chris called to the healer, "you got somethin' for a cold? Ezra's comin down with one. Damned if I know from where."  
  
"Come see Ez." Nathan said  
  
"No, no, no Nathan. It's Ez-ra." Chris said seriously.  
  
"Well, Ez-ra. Come see."  
  
"I assure you Mr. Jackson, your services are unnecessary." Ezra said, walking over to the bar. And then addressing the pretty Mexican woman, "Inez, my lovely, I will be in need of some fine liquor, you know what I desire. Thank you darlin'" Then he turned to go up the stairs to his room without another word.  
  
"Goodnight Ez-ra!" his six friends chorused.  
  
Ezra shook his head as he climbed the stairs and testily retorted, "Goodnight, gentlemen." He didn't let them see the smile that had crept up on his face with a flash of a metallic tooth.  
  
  
THE END  
  
Let me know what ya'll thought!!  
  
  
As a post script to this story. When I wrote the argument with Chris and Ezra about the adjectives and adverbs- and finally Chris told him to shut up about it. I really wanted to make Chris say "So Fuggedabahdit." (or however you spell it) But I left it out since Chris is neither Italian (that we know) or in the mob. But I did think it would be funny to hear him say that so I added it here just for the sake of letting ya'll into my warped mind.  
  
  



End file.
